Society

Thursday

6 Jan 2022

How to wrongfoot an anti-vaxxer

The headline looked promising: ‘How to argue with a Covid anti-vaxxer.’ And, yes, a Times colleague had put together a good, informative feature assessing some of the bogus arguments flying around in this pandemic. But it was not what I was looking for. Since undergraduate days I’ve been fascinated by the category of mental imbalance we call paranoia, believing its milder manifestations to be present to some degree in all of us. Mass paranoia is plainly a strand in the anti-vax movement, and I’ve been listening to a powerful BBC Radio 4 and podcast series researched and presented by Jon Ronson, Things Fell Apart. Ronson looks into the rise of

Douglas Murray

The time has come to get on with our lives

If anyone had any doubts about the wisdom of tempting fate then they probably haven’t considered the case of Betty White and People magazine. Assuming that some Spectator readers are not also subscribers to People, I should inform you that the cover for the current issue features the last of The Golden Girls. ‘Betty White turns 100!’ sings the headline, with the subtitle ‘Funny never gets old’. But while funny may not get old, the issue soon did. White died a few days shy of her 100th birthday, just as People magazine hit the newsstands. It sits there still, the worst example of a cover tempting fate since November 2016,

Martin Vander Weyer

Will the energy price spike bring down Boris?

What does the new year have in store for consumers — and families trying to make ends meet? A stumbling recovery at best, with a continuing tide of inflation that I predict will swiftly pass the Bank of England’s current forecast of ‘around 6 per cent by spring 2022’ and take much longer to turn than the Bank’s Cnut-like posturing seeks to suggest. And driving that surge will be the energy price spike, which could be the factor — far more potent than endemic sleaze and proven incompetence — that topples the Johnson regime. Fact: wholesale natural gas prices have quadrupled in the past year. They may drop again in

Lionel Shriver

The end is always nigh

Typically for my generation, I woke repeatedly as a kid with my pyjamas soaked in sweat because I’d had yet another nightmare about nuclear war. While I rarely dream about mushroom clouds any more, a dark cloud of one shape or another has dogged me like a sooty, vaporous stray for my entire life. For my conservative classmates in the mid-1960s, American democracy was on the cusp of being overtaken by communism, even if they weren’t sure what that bogeyman was. Yet don’t imagine liberals like my parents were by contrast keeping sensibly calm and carrying on. The left has manfully merchandised the end of the world since I can

Rod Liddle

My dog and the NHS have a lot in common

We are considering privatising or selling off our dog, Jessie. She seemed a rather wonderful idea when we got her nine years ago. But since then she has become a hideously bloated, entitled creature who almost by herself determines how we live our lives. In winter she is particularly tyrannical — she has three walks a day, and with darkness falling at four o’clock that means almost every hour of daylight is spent servicing her needs. We cannot go out by ourselves without ensuring she will not be unduly inconvenienced, and as she has grown older so the costs of keeping her have spiralled — and will continue to spiral.

Julie Burchill

Why I love to be hated

I’ve never been keen on the idea of popularity. Courting disapproval has been a large part of my career and I find it bracing, like an early dip in a cold sea. I remember back in 2003 feeling put out because the Most Hated People In Britain list featured me at a mere 85, sandwiched between Damien Hirst and Richard Branson. So imagine my excitement this week on reading that the alleged comedian Stewart Lee had dispatched me into his New Year Pedal Bin, a list of his least-favourite people, alongside such chucklesome types as Ricky Gervais, John Cleese, Graham Linehan, Maureen Lipman and Dave Chappelle. I’ve always fancied myself

Dot Wordsworth

The mechanics of ‘backlash’

‘Lashings of ginger beer?’ asked my husband when I mentioned backlash. He thought the phrase came from Enid Blyton, though it occurred only in the television parody Five Go Mad in Dorset, first shown in 1982 — 40 years ago, for heaven’s sake. Backlash, now in vogue, is often misused. The Guardian wrote about ‘the mass protests in the light of the George Floyd murder and the backlash to this movement’. That usage seems correct. But when it said that Chanel ‘recently faced a backlash online for the contents of their Christmas advent calendar’, backlash was the wrong word. The metaphor backlash comes from mechanics. It is pretty much a

Theo Hobson

Divided we stand: Anglicans need to agree to disagree

Two years ago the Church of England decided to delay any public discussion of its deepest division, over homosexuality, until 2022. So this might be the year in which an already troubled institution has a dramatic public meltdown. Or it might be the year in which the Church of England sorts itself out a bit. Yes, really. Stranger miracles have happened. There are grounds for hope, and not just on the gay issue. The Church has a core strength that it could draw on, and a core identity that could stand it in good stead, though one it is weirdly shy to assert. First let’s admit that things haven’t been

Rory Sutherland

Are electric cars a Columbus’s egg?

The explosion in remote and flexible working accelerated by the pandemic slightly supports my assertion that the most important limits to future innovation may be psychological and behavioural, not technological. I am among a number of people who believe that the newly widespread use of video-conferencing is of great economic significance. A few economists and commentators agree, but all of us suffer mild social embarrassment whenever we make our case: it feels faintly absurd to evangelise a technology which is more than 20 years old, rather than pontificating about the ‘metaverse’ or some other fashionable guff. Yet history bears us out. Because, bizarre as it may seem in retrospect, most

Mary Killen

Dear Mary: How do I stop my daughter-in-law’s daily calls?

Q. I live alone, happily and remotely, but many miles from my immediate family. My son’s wife has very kindly taken it on herself to telephone every day to check on my wellbeing. Apparently she feels that, by so doing, she is giving me the chance to have ‘a chat’. I am grateful, of course, but my problem is that she talks for at least ten minutes each time and, unfortunately, what she has to say is not exactly scintillating. I am concerned that if this goes on, she will start to worry that I find her boring, so can you think of a tactful way in which I can

Toby Young

My plan for the Turner Contemporary

I learnt a horrible new word during the holidays: Twixmas. It refers to the 27-30 December period and has its roots in the word ‘betwixt’, although why anyone would refer to those dates as ‘betwixt’ Christmas and New Year rather than ‘between’ is beyond me. Caroline, who now works in travel, introduced me to it and the reason it came up is that she booked an Airbnb in Margate for precisely those dates. This was to be our Twixmas holiday. Not ideal because there were QPR games on the 27th and the 30th, one of them in Bristol, but by criss-crossing the country in our VW seven-seater I made it

David Mitchell

The surreal joy of putting words in an actor’s mouth

More than 200 non-US residents stood in the queue ahead of me. A grand total of four Homeland Security officers were on duty in the glass booths. I texted my ride to expect me in Arrivals in an hour, at best, and tried to compose the opener for my Spectator diary. I didn’t get far: after an early start in Cork, my long-haul flight from Heathrow to San Francisco and watching Christopher Nolan’s Tenet, my brain was scrambled eggs. Nearby, an elderly traveller fainted. The well-rehearsed response by the tired-looking staff suggested this is a daily, if not an hourly, occurrence. I read a few chapters of Donal Ryan’s novel

Peter Jones

In ancient Rome, the truth could be stranger than fiction

Saturnalia was a period of Roman fun and games held just before our Christmas. Macrobius (c. ad 430) composed a series of conversations enjoyed by cultured Romans over this festive period, covering a vast range of topics, one of which featured amusing true stories. What better way to start the year? The emperor Augustus, tired of being offered epigrams almost daily by a poor Greek, dashed off one in Greek himself and gave it to him. Expressing his admiration, the Greek gave Augustus a few coins, swearing he would have given more if he had them. Everyone burst out laughing, and Augustus gave him 100,000 sesterces. A man appeared in

The Spectator

Which prime ministers have faced the longest wait for honours?

Waiting for the gong Tony Blair was knighted, 14 years after leaving Downing Street. How long have other ex-PMs had to wait to be honoured? Edward Heath knighted in 1992, 18 years after leaving office. Harold Wilson awarded peerage on leaving Commons in 1983, 7 years after resigning as PM. Jim Callaghan awarded peerage on leaving House of Commons in 1987, 8 years after leaving office. Margaret Thatcher awarded peerage in 1992 on leaving House of Commons. John Major knighted in 2005, 8 years after leaving office. Said to have rejected peerage on leaving Commons in 2001. Gordon Brown, David Cameron, and Theresa May are still waiting. Unjabbed nations How

James Fox

Why we go for gold

After taking James Bond hostage, Auric Goldfinger does what all Bond villains do when in a position of power — he spills the beans. ‘Mr Bond, all my life I have been in love,’ he tells him. ‘I have been in love with gold. I love its colour, its brilliance, its divine heaviness… I ask you, is there any other substance that so rewards its owner?’ You don’t have to be a criminal mastermind to understand what Goldfinger means. The hunger for gold is ancient and shows no signs of abating. The metal’s enduring value is dictated above all by scarcity: it makes up just one 500,000,000th of the Earth’s

The Spectator

Letters: Afghan interpreters deserve better from Britain

Welcome changes Sir: Lloyd Evans’s sympathetic piece on the fate of Afghans once they arrive in the UK made for sobering reading (‘New arrivals’, 18 December). In the Sulha Alliance we are endeavouring to support those Afghans and their families who served with and alongside British forces in Afghanistan. That is not the totality of Afghan migrants, but of the former interpreters and their families it can be truly said ‘they are here because we were there’ — and we owe them. I will not go over the whole sorry saga of the UK’s mistreatment of this group, but we really need a step change in how they are looked

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Face masks in schools, vegan nuggets in Burger King and Big Ben bongs again

Home The warmest New Year’s Day on record saw a temperature of 16.3˚C (61.3˚F) in St James’s Park, London. A restored Big Ben rang in the new year for the first time in four years. Boris Johnson,the Prime Minister, announced he would soldier on with Plan B against coronavirus. The government, he said, had identified 100,000 critical workers to receive daily lateral flow tests. Some people would be treated at home in 2,500 ‘virtual beds’. Covid was widespread, thanks to the Omicron variant. In the seven days up to the beginning of this week, 911 people had died with coronavirus (compared with 858 in a week a month earlier), bringing

The Spectator

2535: Triplets – solution

Each unclued lights include one letter three times. The wording of the preamble precludes ALLYLS (2D which would be the second plural) and IRITIC (an adjective). 29D can be either TANNIN or NANKIN. First prize Graeme Davies, Farndon, Newark Runners-up Stephen Saunders, Midford, Bath; Hugh Aplin, London SW19

Mr Magoo

2537: My Lord!

A 21-word exchange appears (apart from two words) in nine unclued entries. The other unclued entry specifies one of the participants. In ten clues the wordplay ignores one letter. These letters, in grid order, spell out the source of the exchange and of the original inspiration. Ignore three apostrophes in the completed puzzle. Across 1 Resorts making lady sip mocha in a new way (12, two words) 12 British proprietor keeps apparently wrapping material (10, two words) 14 Corrupt planet, obscuring sun (3) 15 Sport’s greater rule: tittle-tattle (8) 17 Sacred text, a Latin one, translated (5) 18 Moon at the end of the interval (7) 19 Lobster’s claws

Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: double acrostics

In Competition No. 3230, you were invited to supply a double acrostic poem, the first and last letters of each line, read vertically, spelling out The Spectator and New Statesman in either order. This fiendish technical challenge, designed to sweep away the cobwebs, drew an entry that was on the smallish side but varied and engaging for all that. Some took the topical route. Here’s Tracy Davidson, who turned her sights on the shenanigans at No. 10: Taste turkey crown, then trousers down! Have cheese and wine. It’s work, it’s fine… Other submissions worthy of honourable mentions came from Basil Ransome-Davies, Hugh King, Bob Trewin, Steven Smith and Josephine Boyle.